Turbocharge Your Outbound Lead Qualification - 7 Top Strategies

As B2B sales professionals, we've found that outbound lead qualification is the proactive approach to attracting potential customers through direct and often personalized targeting. 

Instead of waiting for prospects to come to us (as in inbound marketing), we reach out to them through various channels like email, content marketing, cold calling, and social selling. 

Ultimately, any thriving business aims to identify and convert prospects that match an ideal customer profile (ICP).

Outbound Lead Qualification - Why Does It Matter In B2B & B2B2C Sales?

In our experience, outbound lead qualification is a cornerstone for B2B sales for several reasons. 

For starters, it allows us to scale our customer base by actively seeking out and engaging potential clients. This method provides us with a greater degree of control over the sales funnel and accelerates the process. Additionally, outbound strategies enable us to:

• Target specific industries, roles, and decision-makers: This tailored approach ensures that our marketing efforts are directed towards prospects with a higher likelihood of converting.
• Shorten sales cycles: If you were to engage directly with decision-makers, you can bypass several intermediary steps typically involved in inbound processes.
• Generate immediate interest: Our proactive engagement can spark quick dialogues, leading to faster customer acquisition compared to waiting for prospects to discover our offerings.

Overview of Key Roles In Outbound Lead Qualification Processes: SDRs, MDRs, and BDMs

People who are in sales teams, or businesses that rely on cold calling, have seen firsthand how effective outbound lead qualification heavily relies on specialized roles.

These roles span over different categories, such as Sales Development Representatives (SDRs), Market Development Representatives (MDRs), and Business Development Managers (BDMs). 

Each of these roles has distinct responsibilities crucial to the success of any number of outbound strategies.

• Sales Development Representatives (SDRs)

SDRs primarily focus on prospecting and qualifying leads. 

They research potential clients, initiate contact via email or phone, and determine whether a prospect meets the criteria to be passed on to the sales team. 

In any team, SDRs play a vital role in populating the sales funnel with high-quality leads.

• Market Development Representatives (MDRs)

MDRs bridge the gap between marketing and sales. 

These guys manage the initial outreach from marketing campaigns, ensuring that marketing-qualified leads (MQLs) are nurtured and moved down the funnel. 

At Trellus, we have observed that MDRs specialize in deciphering market trends, tailoring pitches, and identifying opportunities within targeted markets.

• Business Development Managers (BDMs)

BDMs concentrate on closing deals. 

They take over leads that have been qualified by the SDRs and MDRs. 

In any organization, BDMs engage in deeper, more personalized conversations with prospects, aiming to understand their needs, propose solutions, and negotiate terms. We see BDMs as the final touchpoint before a prospect becomes a customer.

With this solid foundation in understanding what outbound lead qualification is, its significance, and the essential roles involved, we're now ready to take a deep dive into the various tactics that can elevate our B2B sales efforts.

7 Best Outbound Lead Qualification Strategies That You Need To Implement Today!

Let’s double down on some of the most important lead qualification strategies that you can potentially incorporate in your existing business model.

Bear in mind that these tips are general in nature – as in, you’d need to improvise for the best results.

Okay, enough said!

Let’s get going.

1. Using Cold Calling Techniques To Your Business's Advantage

In our years of experience, we've found that cold calling remains a powerful tactic in outbound lead qualification, especially in the B2B space. 

It provides us with a direct line of communication to potential clients, allowing us to introduce our offerings and start building relationships. 

Mastering cold calling involves developing effective scripts, overcoming objections, and qualifying leads through strategic questioning.

But here’s the problem; businesses that mostly rely on sales calls have targeted number of calls to make each day. 

As a result, sales teams are not only perplexed by the sheer number of calls they have to make, but also it leaves little to no room for improvement. As a result, these individuals are only concerned with dialing the numbers, chatting up prospects, regardless of whether they convert or not, and then move on to the next contact on the list.

However, that used to be the traditional approach.

The modern-day tech landscape has ushered in tons of tools that sales teams and their respective managers can use to improve cold calling conversion rates.

Must Read: 

• AI for Sales Prospecting: A SDR's Ultimate Guide
• 7 Best AI Cold Calling Software Solutions for Outbound Teams

The problem is that even though there’s an abundance of such tools, many businesses, especially the new ones, or small platforms aren’t that much familiar with the right kind of ai-assisted cold calling tools to use.

On top of that, there’s the controversy of auto dialer vs parallel dialer software, where the emphasis is usually on the latter category. 

Although parallel dialers do help your teams to make X number of calls simultaneously, these programs are expensive. In that case, if you are running a small business, your best bet is to rely on auto dialers from longevity and back-to-back uninterrupted single-line dialing perspective.

Speaking of auto dialers, Trellus would be the perfect example for you to take away from.

Trellus.ai is an AI-powered cold calling tool that works as an auto dialer. 

The program works as a simple Google Chrome extension that easily integrates itself into your existing CRMs. On top of that, the ai technology automatically learns from your sales teams’ call patterns, identifies weaknesses, and cues in areas for improvements WHILE the call is ongoing.

Other than that, the program offers a range of benefits that can significantly enhance the productivity and effectiveness of sales teams for cold calling & overall outbound lead qualification.

Real-Time Sales Coaching

• Provides personalized coaching tips during live sales calls to help representatives refine their techniques and improve performance
• Analyzes conversations in real-time and offers instant feedback based on the context of the dialogue

Automation and Insights

• Integrates with existing sales engagement platforms to deliver real-time insights and behavioral prompts based on customer interactions
• Automates mundane tasks like dialing and call routing, allowing sales teams to focus on high-value activities

Comprehensive Insights

• Offers detailed call summaries, transcripts, and analytics to help sales representatives and managers identify areas for improvement
• Provides insights into speech levels, allowing reps to monitor if they are speaking too fast, too slow, softly, or loudly, and when they need to ask more questions

Seamless Integration

• Integrates directly with popular sales engagement platforms like Outreach, Salesloft, HubSpot, and Apollo.io
• Allows users to stay within their current platform, eliminating the need for context-switching between tools

Increased Call Volume

• Features an auto-dialer that ensures instant connections, boosting call volume and efficiency
• Simplifies the sales process and helps businesses improve their productivity and increase their sales

Affordable Pricing

• Offers both free and paid plans with a range of features to suit different needs and budgets
• Provides an accessible solution for individuals and teams looking to streamline their outbound communication and boost call success rates

2. Using Content Marketing To Pivot Lead Qualification Potential

The backbone of any successful content marketing strategy is creating valuable, industry-specific content. 

Having said, that, the content must be both relevant and insightful, offering solutions that resonate with our target audience. 

Feel free to start off by understanding your customer personas and identifying their pain points. Then, you can do research from SEO perspective and create blog posts, whitepapers, and eBooks that address these challenges in-depth. 

Our aim is to position the brand as a go-to resource, building trust and credibility over time.

To remain competitive, you also need to keep an eye on industry trends and regularly update your content to reflect the latest knowledge and best practices. 

What Should Be The Modus Operandi For Content Distribution?

Good question.

Once the content is created and posted on your company’s business website, what’s the next move?

Do you leave it be, and hope for Google to pick up on the pages and spread the love all over the internet?

Google will index your content, but it’s not going to rank easily. Of course, keyword research and well-written insightful pages matter, but as a business relying on lead generation, marketing funnels, and lead qualification, you need to go through a couple of extra steps.

• Social Media: Share your content on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook to expand our reach. We utilize industry-specific hashtags to target our audience more precisely.
• Email Newsletters: Regular email updates can nurture leads by providing them with valuable insights and updates. Feel free to segment your email lists to tailor content according to the recipient's interests and needs.
• Industry Forums and Communities: Participate in relevant forums, like Reddit or specialized industry groups on LinkedIn, sharing our content in responses to questions or discussions. 

Reddit is a bit of a doozy because people over there are very “outspoken” and sometimes “brutally” honest. If you were to market your website, or cold calling service on different subreddits, they’ll sniff it from a mile away and the reaction won’t be very welcoming.

The key to using Reddit for content promotion is to come up with genuine intent; feel free to reveal to your potential users that you have a business that relies on cold calling, and you need eyes for public feedback. They’ll respond to you in a welcoming manner, often criticizing your overall marketing strategies, and help you along the way.

3. Mastering Email Outreach Campaigns

In our experience, we have found that email outreach remains an essential tactic for outbound lead qualification, particularly for B2B sales. 

To master this domain, we focus on three crucial components: crafting compelling subject lines and email copy, utilizing personalization techniques for higher engagement, and implementing effective email follow-up sequences.

Crafting Compelling Subject Lines and Email Copy

The first step to a successful email outreach campaign is to ensure our emails get opened. Normally, subject line is your email's handshake—make it count. Here's how you need do it:

• Be Clear and Compelling: Avoid jargon and get straight to the point. For example, instead of "Innovative Solutions for Your Company," we might use "Boost Your Sales with These Proven Strategies."
• Create Urgency: Phrases like "Limited Time Offer" or "Don't Miss Out" can encourage prospects to act sooner rather than later.
• Personalization: Including the recipient's name in the subject line can significantly boost open rates. We've seen this work time and again.

For the email body, make sure our content is equally engaging:

• Keep It Short: Busy professionals appreciate brevity. Aim for three to five short paragraphs.
• Value Proposition: Outline the benefits our product or service offers. It's all about answering "What's in it for them?"
• Clear Call-to-Action (CTA): Whether it's "Schedule a Call" or "Get Your Free Demo," our CTA is unmistakable and easy to follow.

Personalization Techniques for Higher Engagement

Personalization goes beyond just using the recipient's name. 

• Segmentation: Group your audience based on industry, company size, or previous interactions. This will help you to tailor our messaging to address specific pain points.
• Dynamic Content: Instead of counting on manual work, use email tools that allow for dynamic content. For example, include different product recommendations based on the recipient's role or past behavior.
• Engagement History: Refer to prior interactions or mutual connections. For instance, "I saw you downloaded our e-book on lead generation innovations; here's a follow-up case study you might find insightful."

4. Harnessing the Power of Social Selling

Among many other social media platforms, LinkedIn is more of an undisputed king of professional networking platforms.

Compared to Facebook and Instagram, this platform matters more because it’s oriented towards businesses and business professionals interconnecting with one another.

Having a solid presence here is essential for social selling. 

Start by optimizing our LinkedIn profiles to mirror the needs and interests of our target audience. 

This process typically involves using a professional photo and a headline for your business that clearly states the role/ mission statement of the company and it’s intent. 

Actively participate in industry-related groups. 

We recommend creating a posting schedule and putting up with it in a very consistent manner.

5. Engaging with Prospects through Other Social Media Platforms

Moving on, since the inception of social media platforms, sharing on the network has gained a lot of traction.

It not only builds credibility, but also keeps the ball moving forward – as in your posts, and company profile remains in front of everyone, normally to be seen regularly by relevant businesses and prospects.

Begin with identifying the platforms where your target audience is most active. 

Apart from LinkedIn, since we already talked about the platform, other examples where you can push the envelope are Twitter and Facebook. Other than that, there are plenty of niche forums and communities where you can partake in conversing with different individuals; most of them will turn out to be prospects if you are not just there to be noticed.

Regardless of any platform where you are engaging prospects for outbound lead qualification and generation, make sure that your content/ posts are insightful and have brevity.

Offer something original; it could be centered around pain points, something shared as a thought leader, or anything that sticks out like a sore thumb. People will respond to something they see of value. 

Generic content – and that too, when it comes off as ‘copy-pasta’ from other content creators, spun over a bunch of A.I. tools isn’t going to cut it. 

So, think outside the box while you’re at it.

6. Use Social Listening Tools for Lead Identification

Social listening has been a game-changer for us. 

It's the practice of monitoring social media channels for mentions of our brand, competitors, and relevant topics. 

Tools like Hootsuite, Brandwatch, and Mention help us track these mentions and uncover valuable insights about our audience's needs and interests.

While you’re at it, go ahead and set up alerts for keywords related to our industry and products. 

Doing so will help you to identify potential leads when they express a need or ask questions online. Once you have picked up something on the radar, make sure to engage promptly with these individuals by offering solutions or sharing helpful content, positioning our brand as a go-to resource.

7. Implementing Targeted PPC Campaigns

When it’s about running PPC campaigns, a lot of businesses make the mistake of shelling out cash over a bunch of keywords.

Case in point, it won’t get you anywhere – especially if the keywords are expensive, or your competitors are already running ads against them.

On top of that, B2B dynamics are different from B2C, necessitating a strategic approach to keyword selection. 

Start by brainstorming a list of keywords related to our industry, products, and services. Tools like Google Keyword Planner help us identify keywords with the right balance of search volume and competition.

Focus on long-tail keywords. 

These are more specific and often indicate a higher intent to purchase. For example, instead of targeting "CRM software," we might target "CRM software for small businesses." 

The above ones are just a few examples. You need to find relevant stuff against your business and then plan and deploy your strategies accordingly.

Over To You!

And there you have it, some of the most important lead qualification strategies that teams and businesses use for outbound marketing campaigns. 

In case you don’t see your favorite go-to strategy on the list above, feel free to holler. We’d be more than happy to make the addition for you.